2023-05-25 20:18:47
How often someone is bitten by mosquitoes depends not only on the individual odor profile of a person, but also on the shower gel.
Munich – A group of friends are sitting around a campfire, after a while some already have numerous bites, while others were spared. Scientists from the USA are now looking for the background. A scientific study by researchers from the US university Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University gives an indication that the shower gel can play a role in this.
Certain shower gels increase the attractiveness to mosquitoes
“We were able to show that soaps change mosquito host selection, with some soaps increasing host attractiveness and some soaps decreasing it,” the authors of the study said of their results.
To find their “prey,” mosquitoes look for certain volatile organic compounds called VOCs that form an “olfactory odor footprint.” Plants, animals and humans emit these substances, but their chemical composition differs in each case. Most people regularly use personal care products such as soaps, shower gels and perfumes, thereby changing their olfactory signature. Because many of the synthetic fragrances it contains are inspired by flower extracts.
The analytical methods identified the key chemicals responsible for these changes, the study said. With the help of these chemical substances, both an effective mosquito defense and a bait for the animals can be produced, the scientists concluded. Mosquitoes are considered the most dangerous animals in the world because they can transmit pathogens such as malaria, dengue fever or the Zika virus.
To the study
The study “Soap application alters mosquito-host interactions” by authors Morgen VanderGiessen, Anaïs K. Tallon, Bryn Damico, Chloé Lahondère and Clément Vinauger at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University was published in the journal on May 10, 2023 iScience.
Mosquito attractant or protection? The researchers examined these shower gels
The researchers examined both unwashed and washed odor samples from four subjects at different times. According to this, aldehydes, ketones and esters dominated the odor profile in the unwashed samples, after the use of soap the proportion of terpenes increased. These messenger substances, known as semiochemicals, inform the mosquito, among other things, about the attractiveness of the host, the location of a plant or possible egg-laying sites. However, certain terpenes can also have a repellent effect. “The composition and concentration of terpenes is therefore probably an important factor” in how attractive certain people are to mosquitoes, the researchers conclude.
The researchers selected Dial, Dove, Native and Simple Truth soaps for their study. As justification, the scientists stated that the market share of these products in the USA is 53 percent. Simple Truth and Native, the two soaps advertised as more “natural,” actually tended to be less “chemical-heavy” than Dial and Dove’s products, according to the researchers. For example, the more natural products had a lower abundance of saturated and unsaturated hydrocarbons such as alkanes and alkenes. However, according to the study, the most important factor in determining how attractive a person is to mosquitoes is the interaction between soap and the individual odor profile of the person in question. “Of the four soaps tested, Dove and Simple Truth significantly increased the attractiveness of some but not all subjects, indicating an interactive effect between the host’s odor profile and the soap chemistry,” the authors said.
As proof of this, the scientists also used the well-known mosquito repellent limonene from the terpene group, which showed no repellent effect on mosquitoes in three out of four soaps tested. Factors such as genetic differences, gender, age, food intake, exercise, pregnancy and health status also influence a person’s individual odor profile. Further studies on the subject are still pending.
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